Related Videos

I’m surprised that Mayor Stephen Mandel is surprised to learn the city transportation department is pushing an anti-car agenda.

If you read just about any city planning document, the goal of getting cars off city streets is obvious. This includes the city’s 10-year development plan and the Bicycle Transportation Plan approved by council in 2009 while Mandel was in his second term as mayor.

You don’t even have to read the fine print.

For instance, in the preamble to the 2013 city budget, bureaucrats say up front that the spending projections inside are in keeping with “Edmonton’s 10-year goals to: shift transportation modes, transform the urban form, improve livability, preserve and sustain our environment, diversify the economy and ensure financial sustainability.

Guess what’s No. 1?

See what’s #1, ahead of even economic development, public safety and prudent management of tax dollars? That’s right, “shifting transportation modes.” In other words, one of the principal goals of city planners is getting Edmontonians out of their cars and into buses and LRT, or onto bikes.

They repeat their anti-car mantra over and over, although I am sure they would bristle at their philosophy being categorized as anti-car.

In the propaganda brochure produced by city officials to promote their goal of creating 500 km of bike lanes on roads throughout the city, our cheery nanny statists insist cycling to work will lower your personal cost of transportation, “improve your physical condition,” reduce traffic congestion and “reduce vehicle emissions.” All of those, in one way or another, articulate a problem planners see with cars.

Three years ago, city transportation planners and a handful of councillors proposed reducing many four-lane roadways in the westend to two lanes for cars and two lanes for express buses – so called BRT or bus rapid transit.

Clearly, one of the goals was to make commuting by car so unpleasant and inconvenient that motorists would give up and start taking the bus.

Similarly, last year, municipal bureaucrats proposed allowing developers of high-rise condos to bypass the usual requirement of constructing a parkade beneath their new buildings. Undoubtedly, part of their wishful thinking was that if residents had to pay separately for parking and had to park a block or two away they would be encouraged to give up their cars.

The push for LRT construction and ever greater subsidies for bus routes are also part of the city’s carrot-and-stick approach to getting residents out of their private vehicles and onto public transit.

So are at least some city bureaucrats anti-car, as Mayor Mandel charges? Well, d’uh. It’s nothing new.

The bigger problem is not so much the aggressive push for more designated bike lanes or shared car-bike lanes on major streets. I’m not even sure the advocates of shared lanes could define how they are different from ordinary streets on which motorists and cyclists have to share the road.

The problems are twofold: The city’s efforts will largely be useless at encouraging more bike riders and increasing cyclists’ safety. Meanwhile in those neighbourhoods where on-street parking is banned in favour of bike lanes, property values will decline and business will dip.

A tough sell

Homes where there is no parking out front are tougher to sell, while businesses without convenient parking have a harder time attracting customers.

Also, there is unlikely to be more money to clear snow from back lanes to make the use of garages easier where on-street parking becomes forbidden to accommodate bike lanes.

GUNTER: Anti-car bicycle lanes in Edmonton are a tough sell

Business will dip in favour of bike lanes

I’m surprised that Mayor Stephen Mandel is surprised to learn the city transportation department is pushing an anti-car agenda.

If you read just about any city planning document, the goal of getting cars off city streets is obvious. This includes the city’s 10-year development plan and the Bicycle Transportation Plan approved by council in 2009 while Mandel was in his second term as mayor.

You don’t even have to read the fine print.

For instance, in the preamble to the 2013 city budget, bureaucrats say up front that the spending projections inside are in keeping with “Edmonton’s 10-year goals to: shift transportation modes, transform the urban form, improve livability, preserve and sustain our environment, diversify the economy and ensure financial sustainability.